Lamentation

Chapter Forty-five

Philip was waiting in my office. He looked haggard. ‘What has happened?’ I asked breathlessly. ‘Not more accusations?’

It was more a tremor than a shake of the head. ‘No, not that.’ He swallowed. ‘Edward Cotterstoke is dead.’

I thought of the desperate figure in the boat that morning. Edward was not young, and the last few days had turned his world upside down. ‘How?’

Philip took a deep breath, then started to sob. He put a clenched fist to his mouth, fought to bring himself under control. ‘By his own hand. I took him home, fed him and put him to bed, for he seemed at his last gasp. He must have taken the knife from the kitchen. A sharp one.’ He shuddered, his whole solid frame trembling. ‘I went to see how he was, two hours ago, and he had slit his throat, from ear to ear. It must have taken great force.’ He shook his head. ‘There is blood everywhere, but that is the least of it. His soul, his soul. He was in great torment, but such a sin...’ He shook his head in despair.

I remembered Cotterstoke’s words on the boat, talking of the disgrace that confessing to his stepfather’s murder would bring his family. He had said he knew what had to be done. I said, ‘He felt he deserved death for what he did, and believed he was damned anyway; he did not want his family to suffer.’

Philip laughed savagely. ‘They will suffer now.’

I answered quietly, ‘Suicide is a terrible disgrace, but less than murder. His family will not see him hang, nor will his goods be distrained to the King.’

‘There could have been some other way; we could have talked about it, talked with our vicar. This is — is not — sane.’

‘After what had just happened to him, anyone might lose their reason. Perhaps God will take account of that.’

A reply from Hampton Court arrived just as I was going to bed. Martin brought it up, his expression a deferential mask as usual. I examined the Queen’s seal carefully in the privacy of my room, to ensure it was unbroken, before opening it. The letter was from Lord Parr:

I felt relieved as I laid down the letter. Lord Parr’s tone was friendly; the observation about Barak made me smile. The Queen and her uncle had not, after all, abandoned me. The story about Jane Fool rang true. I wondered, not for the first time, whether she was a fool of any sort at all, or merely a woman who had found a profitable role in pretending it.

Next day was the 17th, only three days before the admiral’s arrival at Greenwich, and I still needed a gold chain. I went to a shop in the goldsmith’s quarter, one of the smaller ones, guarded outside by a large man ostentatiously bearing a club. Barak accompanied me. Asking around on my behalf, he had discovered the service this shop provided.

Inside, another man was posted beside an inner door. The owner, a stout elderly fellow, came over and gave me a deep bow. ‘God give you good morrow, sir.’

‘And to you. I require a gold chain; I have to be at the ceremony welcoming the French admiral on Saturday.’

‘Ah yes, his progress through the city. It has brought some good business.’ He looked me over professionally. ‘A lawyer, sir? Is that a serjeant’s coif you wear?’

‘Well observed.’

‘It is the nature of my business, to judge who people are. You should buy a good long chain, with thick links.’ He smiled unctuously.

‘I look only to rent one, for a week.’

The man stared. ‘Rent?’ He shook his head. ‘People are expected to wear their own chains on such an occasion, of a size in accordance with their status. To rent one —’ he shook his head sadly — ‘that might be thought shameful among your colleagues, if it got out.’

‘So it would,’ I agreed. ‘That is why I asked my clerk here to find a goldsmith who rented chains discreetly.’

‘Best look one out and save time,’ Barak told the goldsmith cheerfully. ‘I know you rent them for a good price.’

That got the goldsmith moving: he went into the back room and returned with a heavy chain with large, solid links. It was a little dirty, but gold is easily cleaned. I wrote a note confirming receipt, paid over a half-sovereign as deposit, and asked Barak to put the chain in his knapsack.

‘Don’t you want to wear it?’ he asked mockingly.

‘Not till I have to.’

I had agreed to go down to Greenwich with Barak, Tamasin and Nicholas on Friday, to watch Admiral d’Annebault’s arrival. He would be welcomed by the King and stay the night at Greenwich Palace before his procession through London on Saturday. Going to see this would help me get used to it all, before playing my, mercifully small, part later.

The four of us met at Temple Stairs. There were many people waiting for wherries and tilt-boats to take them downriver; mostly family groups in their best clothes, for the day had been declared a public holiday. One young man stood alone, his expression grave; he had only one leg and stood on crutches. I wondered if he had been a soldier in the war.

Our turn came and a tilt-boat, with a white canopy to shield us from the sun, took us down the busy river. Even the boatman was dressed cheerfully, a garland of flowers in his cap. Tamasin sat under the canopy with Barak, Nicholas and me on the bench opposite, Nicholas wearing a broad hat against the sun. I had on my robe, but no chain.

Tamasin looked cheerfully out over the brown water. ‘I wonder if we shall get close enough to see the King. They distributed a leaflet giving the details. He will be on the royal barge just below Greenwich, and the admiral’s barge will pull up beside it for the King to welcome him aboard.’

I looked at her. Her time of sickness was over and she was blooming. She wore the dress she had worn at George’s birthday, yellow with a bonnet, a little ruby brooch at her breast. She met my gaze and leaned over, putting her hand on mine. ‘I know this will be hard for you, sir, after last year. Forgive my enthusiasm, but I do not see much spectacle.’

‘While I see too much. But no, Tamasin, enjoy the day.’

The river turned south, past the Isle of Dogs. The path winding around it was filled with people of the poorer classes, walking down to watch the admiral’s arrival. Beyond the muddy path was marshy woodland dotted with vegetable gardens that cottagers had set up, their shacks in the middle. Guard dogs tied to posts barked furiously at all the passers-by.

Greenwich Palace, built by the King’s father as a symbol of the new Tudor dynasty, came into view, with its splendid facade and pointed towers. Boats were pulling into the bank on both sides of the river, passengers disembarking and walking on to get as close as possible to the palace. Our boat pulled in to the left-hand bank. Beside the palace I saw a great barge at anchor, brightly painted in Tudor green and white, an enormous English flag flying from the prow. A dozen liveried oarsmen sat on each side, now and then sculling with their oars to keep the craft steady. The barge had a long cabin gilded with gold and silver. Purple curtains had been pulled back to show those within, but they were too far away to make out. Tamasin leaned over the edge of the crowded path to see better, risking a fall into the mud below, and Barak pulled her back. ‘Control yourself, woman.’

For a while nothing happened. We stood amid the watching, murmuring crowd. Beyond the barge a long row of mighty warships was moored along the south shore. The King’s great ships, which I had seen last year at Portsmouth. Streamers in many colours, some a hundred feet long, were hung from the masts and swung gently in the light river breeze. The ships themselves I remembered: enormous, magnificent, their upper decks brightly painted. One, though, was absent: the King’s favourite warship, the Mary Rose, now sunk at the bottom of the Solent.

There was a crash as gunports opened along the sides of the ships. Cannon appeared and fired volleys; no actual cannonballs, of course, but emitting thick clouds of smoke and making enough noise to shake the pathway. People shouted and cheered. Nicholas joined in enthusiastically, waving his hat in the air. Some women whooped at the noise, though Tamasin glanced at me with a sombre face.

Then they appeared, coming fast upriver; first a French warship, guns firing on both sides, then over a dozen French galleys, long and narrow: sleek, fast vessels of war. They were brightly painted, each in a different colour, and their cannon, set in the prows, fired off blasts in reply to ours. The largest galley, covered from prow to stern in a white canopy decorated in gold fleur-de-lys, pulled alongside the King’s barge.

It was too much for me. The sight of those galleys, which I had last seen firing at the Mary Rose; the smoke; the gunfire that shook the ground. I touched Barak on the shoulder. ‘I have to go.’

He looked at me with concern. ‘God’s blood, you look sick. You shouldn’t go alone. Nick, get a boat.’

‘No!’ I answered stubbornly. ‘I’ll be all right, you stay here.’

Nicholas and Tamasin were also staring. Tamasin took my hand. ‘Are you sure? I could see you were troubled earlier.’

‘I will be all right.’ I felt ashamed of my weakness.

‘Nick,’ Barak said peremptorily, ‘go back with him.’

The boy stepped forward. I opened my mouth to protest, then shrugged.

‘Call on us later,’ Tamasin said.

I nodded. ‘I will.’

I walked away, fast as I could through the crowds, Nicholas for once having to lengthen his long stride to keep up with me. The endless crash of cannon suddenly ceased; the admiral must have boarded the King’s barge at last.

‘Watch out there!’ a man called out as I nearly fell into him. Nicholas grasped my arm.

‘He’s drunk, sodden old hunchback,’ another man observed. And in truth it was as though I were drunk, the ground like a ship’s deck, seeming to shift and slide beneath my feet.

We got a boat to the Steelyard stairs. When we stepped off I felt strange, light-headed. Nicholas said, ‘Shall I walk you home?’ He was embarrassed, and had hardly spoken during the journey.

‘No. We’ll walk to chambers.’

Today being a holiday and so many people down at Greenwich, the city was quiet, as though it were a Sunday. I was walking steadily again now, but thought with renewed grief of my friends who had died on the Mary Rose. Their faces came before me. And then I found myself saying an inward goodbye to them all, and something lifted in my heart.

‘Did you say something, sir?’ Nicholas asked.

I must have murmured aloud. ‘No. No, nothing.’ Looking round, I realized we were at Lothbury. ‘We are close to the Cotterstoke house,’ I said. ‘Where that painting is.’

‘What will happen to it now?’

‘Edward’s half of his mother’s estate will go to his family. In these circumstances I imagine his wife will want to get rid of the house as soon as possible, painting or no painting.’

‘Then Mistress Slanning may get her way.’

‘Yes. I suppose she may.’

He hesitated, then asked, ‘Will Master Coleswyn tell Edward Cotterstoke’s wife why her husband took his life? That old murder?’

‘No. I am sure not.’

I realized the old servant, Vowell, would know nothing of Edward’s death. Perhaps I should tell him, and make sure he kept his mouth shut.

The old house was quiet as ever. Nearby a barber had opened his shop, but there was little custom and he stood leaning disconsolately against a wall under his striped pole. I remembered Rowland saying I needed to shave before taking my place for d’Annebault’s progress through London tomorrow; I would do so after visiting Vowell. I knocked at the door.

He opened it at once. He looked agitated, his eyes wide. He stared at us in surprise, then leaned forward and spoke quietly, his voice shaking. ‘Oh, sir, it is you. I sent for Master Dyrick.’ He frowned. ‘I didn’t think he would send you in his place. Sir, it may not be safe for you.’ I lowered my voice in turn. ‘What do you mean, fellow? I have not come from Dyrick.’ I took a deep breath. ‘I came to tell you poor Edward Cotterstoke is dead.’

Vowell wrung his hands. ‘I know, and by his own hand. One of his servants told someone who knows me. Wretched gossiping women, everybody knows already. Mistress Slanning—’

‘Isabel knows?’

‘Knows, sir, and is here.’ He cast a backward glance at the gloomy hall. ‘In such a state as I have never seen anyone. She insisted I let her in. She has a knife, sir, a big knife she took from the kitchen. I fear she may do as her brother did—’

I raised a hand; the frightened old man’s voice was rising. ‘Where is she?’

‘In the parlour, sir. She just stands looking at the painting — she will not move, nor answer me — holding that knife.’

I looked at Nicholas. ‘Will you come with me?’ I whispered.

‘Yes.’

We stepped inside, past Vowell. The door to the parlour was open. I walked in quietly, Nicholas just behind. There, with her back to me, stood Isabel. She wore one of her fine satin dresses, light brown today, but had cast her hood on the floor. It left her head bare, long silvery-grey tresses cascading down her shoulders. She was staring at the wall painting, quite motionless, and as Vowell had said, a broad, long-bladed knife was clutched in her right hand, so tightly that each bony white knuckle stood out. The image of her mother and father, of little Edward and her own young self, stared back at her, appearing more real than ever to me at that terrifying moment.

She did not even seem to be aware that we had come in. Vowell stayed outside; I heard him breathing hard in the corridor.

Nicholas stepped quietly forward, but I put up a hand to restrain him. I said softly, ‘Mistress Slanning.’ Strange, even in that extremity, I could not allow myself the presumption of calling her by her first name.

I would not have thought her body could have tensed any further but it did, becoming quite rigid. Then, slowly, she turned her head to look at me. Those blue eyes, so like her brother’s, were wild and staring. Her brows drew together in a frown.

‘Master Shardlake?’ she said in a quiet, puzzled voice. ‘Why are you here?’

‘I came to speak to Vowell. To tell him your brother is dead.’ I moved my right hand a little. ‘Mistress Slanning, please let me have that knife.’ She did not reply; her breath came in short pants, as though she were trying to hold it in, to stop breathing. ‘Please,’ I implored. ‘I wish only to help you.’

‘Why would you help me? I tried to destroy you, and Edward and that lawyer Coleswyn. I called you heretics. As you are.’ Her grip on the knife tightened, and she lifted the blade slightly.

‘I think you were not yourself. Please, mistress, give me the knife.’ I took half a step forward, stretching out my hand.

She slowly lifted the knife towards her throat.

‘No!’ Nicholas cried out, with such force and passion that Isabel paused, the blade almost at her neck, where the arteries pulsed under the wrinkled white skin.

‘It’s not worth it!’ he said passionately. ‘Whatever you did, madam, whatever your family did, it’s not worth that!’

She stared at him for a moment. Then she lowered the knife, but held it pointing outwards. I raised my arm to protect myself, fearing she would attack: Isabel was a thin, ageing woman, but desperation gives strength to the weakest. But it was not us she attacked; instead she turned round again and thrust the knife into her beloved picture, stabbing at it with long, powerful slashes, so hard that a piece of plaster broke off beside the crack in the wall that the experts had noticed. She went on and on, making desperate grunting sounds, as more of the paint and plaster crumbled. Then her hand slipped and the knife gashed her other arm, blood spurting through the fabric of her dress. She winced at the unexpected pain and dropped the knife. Clutching her arm, Isabel crumpled in a heap on the floor, and began to cry. She lay there, sobbing desperately with the grief and guilt of a lifetime.

Nicholas stepped forward quickly, picked up the knife and took it outside to Vowell. The old servant stared at Isabel in horror through the doorway. The painting was now scored with innumerable slashes, spaces where pieces of plaster had fallen revealing the lath behind. A tiny stream of plaster dust trickled down. I saw that the section of the painting she had attacked most fiercely, now almost entirely obliterated, was her mother’s face.

I looked at Nicholas, who was pale and breathing hard. Then I knelt beside Isabel. ‘Mistress Slanning?’ I touched her shoulder lightly. She flinched, huddling further away from me, as though she would squeeze herself into the floor, clutching at her injured arm.

‘Mistress Slanning,’ I said gently. ‘You have cut yourself, your arm needs binding.’

The sobbing ceased and she turned her head to look at her arm. Her expression was bereft, her hair wild. She looked utterly pitiful. Lifting her eyes, she met mine briefly before shuddering and turning her face away. ‘Do not look at me, please.’ She spoke in an imploring whisper. ‘No one should look at me now.’ She took a deep, sobbing breath. ‘He was innocent, our stepfather, a good man. But we did not see it, Edward and I, till it was too late. Our mother was cruel, she left that Will so we would quarrel, I understand it now. It was because both Edward and I loved the painting so. Mother never wanted us to visit her, but I would come sometimes, to see the painting. To see our father again.’

I looked at their mother’s empty chair, facing what was left of the painting, the embroidery still lying on the seat.

‘He died so suddenly, our father. Why did he leave us? Why?’ She wept again, the tears of a lost child. ‘Oh, Edward! I drove him to that unclean act. All these years I could have confessed; the old faith allows that if you repent and confess your sins it is enough, you are forgiven. His faith did not allow even that. But I —’ her voice fell to a whisper — ‘my hardened heart would not allow me to confess. But it was both of us together did that thing, both of us!’

I jumped at the sound of a sharp knock at the door. I heard Vowell and another voice, and then Vincent Dyrick strode into the room, gown billowing theatrically behind him, his lean hawk face furious. He looked at Nicholas and me, at Isabel weeping on the floor, then gaped at the wrecked painting.

‘Shardlake! What have you done? Why is my client in this state?’

I rose slowly to my feet, my knees cracking and my back protesting in pain. Isabel was looking at Dyrick; it was the same puzzled, otherworldly look Edward had worn in the Tower, as though she barely understood who he was.

‘Ask her,’ I answered heavily.

Dyrick was staring again at the painting. Perhaps he saw the prospect of endless fees from this case trickling away like the plaster dust still falling from the ruined wall. ‘Who did this?’

‘Isabel, I fear.’

‘Christ’s wounds!’ Dyrick looked down at his client. Isabel was still hunched over, so ashamed she could not meet our eyes. ‘See her condition —’ He pointed at me. ‘I cannot be held responsible for anything she has done! It was she who insisted on sending a copy of that complaint to the Privy Council. I tried to dissuade her!’

‘I know. And I may tell you, since Isabel is your client and you must keep it confidential, that Edward and Isabel conspired to murder their stepfather the best part of half a century ago. Edward has killed himself, and Isabel might have done the same had we not come in time.’ I looked again at the painting. ‘This is a tragedy, Dyrick. One made worse by the tangles of litigation, as their mother intended. My efforts with Brother Coleswyn to find a settlement only uncovered a horror,’ I added sadly.

I stepped wearily to the door. Dyrick looked down at Isabel.

‘Wait!’ he said, turning. ‘You cannot leave me alone with her, in this state —’

‘Vowell will help you bind her wound. Then, if you will take my honest advice, you should send for her priest. Make sure it is him, she is of the old religion and it matters to her. He may be able to help her, I do not know.’ I turned to Nicholas. He was looking at the face of Isabel’s father, still staring out from the wreckage with his benevolent, confident, patrician air. ‘Come, lad,’ I said. We walked past Dyrick, past old Vowell, out into the street.

There, in the August sunshine, I turned to Nicholas. ‘You saved her.’

‘She came to this, even with a good and loving father,’ he said quietly. And I realized with a chill that his parents’ letter had brought thoughts of suicide to Nicholas as well. But he had rejected them, and that was why he had been so passionate with Isabel. ‘What will happen to her?’ he asked.

‘I do not know.’

‘Perhaps it is too late for that poor woman now.’ Nicholas took a deep breath and stared at me, his green eyes hard and serious. ‘But not for me.’

Early the following afternoon I stood at the front of a great concourse outside the church of St Michael le Querne, which gave onto the open space at the west end of Cheapside. More crowds lined the length of Cheapside, along which Admiral d’Annebault would shortly progress. Mayor Bowes, whom I had last seen at Anne Askew’s burning, stood alone on a little platform. I waited in a line with the aldermen and other leading citizens of London, all wearing our gold chains. As at the burnings, a white-robed cleric stood at a makeshift lectern, but on this occasion he was to deliver an oration in French, welcoming the admiral to the city. There was a steady murmur of voices, while water tinkled in the conduit by the church.

The admiral had come by boat from Greenwich to the Tower that morning, all his galleys following. The previous evening I had taken Nicholas with me to visit Barak and Tamasin, and had spent a quiet night playing cards. I had not told them what had happened to Isabel — it was no thing for Tamasin to hear in her condition. Then I had gone home and slept late, to be woken by the crash of guns from the Tower welcoming the admiral. Even out at Chancery Lane the noise rattled the windows. From the Tower d’Annebault would progress through the city, finishing at St Michael’s Church, accompanied by the Queen’s brother, William Parr, the other great men of the realm following.

Martin helped dress me in my very best. I put on the gold chain which I had set him to cleaning last night. Neither of us said a word. Then I walked down to the church. As I left I saw Timothy peering through the half-open door of the stable, looking disconsolate. I knew I must speak to him about Martin’s betrayal; but for now Lord Parr had sworn me to secrecy and I gave the boy only a severe look. Too severe, perhaps, but I was still sore troubled by what he had done, and by my experiences of recent days.

A royal official lined us up, peremptorily ordering the mayor and aldermen into position like children. The sun beat down, making our heads hot under our caps and coifs. The golden links of our chains sparkled. Streamers and poles bearing the English flag beside the fleur-de-lys of France fluttered in the breeze, and bright cloths, too, had been hung from the upper windows of houses and shops. I remembered how only a year before I had seen dummies wearing the fleur-de-lys used in target practice by new recruits to the army — hundreds of men who had marched to Portsmouth from London to resist the threatened invasion.

Next to me Serjeant Blower of the Inner Temple stood proudly, his fat belly sucked in and his chest thrust out. He was in his fifties, with a short, neatly trimmed beard. I knew him slightly; he was too full of himself for my taste. It was said that Wriothesley was considering appointing him a judge. ‘We have a fine day to greet the admiral,’ he said. ‘I cannot remember such ceremonial since Anne Boleyn’s coronation.’

I raised my eyebrows, remembering how that much-acclaimed marriage had ended.

‘Are you going to be present when Prince Edward meets the admiral tomorrow?’ Blower asked. ‘And at the Hampton Court celebrations?’

‘Yes, representing Lincoln’s Inn.’

‘I too,’ he said proudly. He looked askance at my chain. ‘Have you had that long? By the smell of vinegar you have just had it cleaned.’

‘I only wear it on the most special occasions.’

‘Really? It looks somewhat scratched.’ Blower glanced proudly down at the broad, bright links of his own chain. Then he leaned closer and said quietly, ‘Could you not find time to shave, brother? We were instructed to. It is a pity your hair is dark, your stubble shows.’

‘No, Brother Blower. I fear I have been very busy.’

‘In the vacation?’

‘I have had some hard cases.’

‘Ah.’ He nodded, then quoted the old legal saying, ‘Hard cases make bad law.’

‘They do indeed.’

He gave me a sidelong look. I wondered if news of my appearance before the council had filtered out. Servants would speak to servants at Whitehall, the city and the Inns of Court. A rousing cheer sounded from Cheapside. People had been told to cry a welcome as d’Annebault passed. Blower pulled his fat stomach in further. ‘Here he comes,’ he said eagerly, and shouted a loud ‘Hurrah!’